Here's How Far My Cheap Nissan LEAF Goes On A Charge! Charging & 70-MPH Range Tests 

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I recently sold my 2012 Leaf, it just didn’t meet my needs other than getting to work. Probably the best car I EVER owned. Other than range, of course. Smooth ride, zippy acceleration, zero maintenance. Even got to charge it for free at my local Nissan dealer a lot of the time. Had it 6 years.

Alyssa’s reaction after you said “50.2 miles” is hilarious 😂😂 that “Wowwwww” was so funny

Next video: Drag race between Nissan Leaf vs Tesla Model S Plaid

For me, this was more interesting than a Plaid video.

I daily-drive a 2013 Leaf with about 60K miles. I love it. It's a city car really, since the range is down to about 60 miles w/o HVAC. Now, that 60 miles covers about 95% of my driving, with a Volvo S80 as a backup for longer trips. I've replaced one tire due to a puncture, and a set of wiper blades in 4 1/2 year of ownership. Great-driving car.

Was looking at 30 minute long video, testing leaf at 70mph ... sounds about right.

Not long after watching your video I was finally able to buy a Nissan Leaf for myself. My first EV. The trip home was 112 miles from the dealership. Best distance it was able to achieve between charges was 64 miles at highway speeds 65-70mph. So far I love my little go-cart. 😊

In the end the GOM was correct at 50. In the right conditions you can hit about 6 miles/kWh if eco driving around town. I can see this car getting around 85 miles assuming there is 15 kWh available. Love your maniacal enthusiasm. You can also reset the mi/kWh meter before the trip.

I bought my Leaf about 3 years ago. I had been watching electric car prices for a while and I could not figure out why these were so cheap. I did not get answers so I decided to buy one to figure it out. My cost was about $4500 for 2013 in perfect shape. The battery had 10 out of 12 bars left. It was a high mileage one at 71,000 miles but being garaged stored it was in perfect shape and mileage means less with ecars, it is the battery condition that is important. The old technology golf cart I wanted was $8000 used (they all looked like they got dragged up from a lake). And they used lead acid batteries, could not go on streets above 36 mph, had no AC, and had no doors etc., basically they were no comparison to the Leaf. A new golf cart cost $25,000 and above, an absolutely crazy price? The Leaf I bought has grabby brakes, it does not handle well on curves, the doors are tinny, and when you shut them things rattle. If I go through a car wash water comes flooding in. And I had to compare this to my last car which was a Mazda Protégé 5 which is an absolutely amazing car, it handles so well, like driving a go cart. But I absolutely love my Leaf. So nice, no gas station to hassle with. And it was so good, I sold a great car, so no more Mazda. I absolutely love it. so simple to use, no gas stations, no oil change, no engine to worry about, no transmission to worry about, no cooling system to worry about, I could go on and on, but you get it. Not one problems in 3 years of ownership.

Enjoy your adventures with used Leaf. I'm the guy with the Sky Blue 2012 Leaf charging beside you at the Powerhouse about 4 weeks ago when you asked me what I would sell mine for. Sure was surprised the next week when you bought one and brought it home. Just to compare your bargain to mine.... last Nov I scored a 2012 for $4,000 34k miles perfect body and interior, working onboard charger! (off of Craigslist) So when you test it out I really enjoy your adventures because I'm right along beside you with my sister Leaf every mile. P.S You shared with me a secret of your future modification plans but I won't tell!

A LEAF should be the second car in every 2+ car household. Cheap to get and aside from the battery, Nissan have done a wonderful job designing this very efficient city runabout. The LEAF's battery, unlike newer EVs, is relatively simple to change and there are already some companies designing aftermarket batteries for it.

*Yes, I would love to see you do a city driving range test!!!*

Alyssa could not be less interested, her reactions make me laugh every video.

THE highway range test of the year, LOL. But you have to give it to Kyle for how enthusiastic he is with this testing of the Leaf. Looking forward to the around town range test and then the comparison of efficiency.

that little car save me around 3K in gasoline this summer, yes has a small battery, and needs to recharge often, but for local runs is great. one tip for highways, use Drive mode to accelerate fast, get to the speed you need and then just slightly add power to maintain speed, you drain the battery less that way.

Nice run, Kyle! That was pretty brave toward the end. I think that pulse to 40kW is what really made it panic. There is a precursor to Turtle-mode, and those are the "POWER" bubbles. Normally, they're all doubled up. At 27:46, two of the double-bubbles turned to single (unusable) ones - same as "dashes" on the high end of the power meter on the Tesla. At 28:15, four total were single. At 28:40, you got the turtle and 8 of 9 were single. Also at high SoC (like at 14:52), you don't have double-bubbles on the regen (left) side - same as Tesla dashes on the left. Interestingly, comparing the LeafSpy consumed number at the start (at 12:30, 4447Wh) to the end (at 29:40, 19740Wh), you actually got 15.3kWh out of the pack. Congrats! Edit: Also noticed the GOM was dead on from the start - how often does THAT happen?!

That was a perfect scenario with the roll into the charging spot. Nice work!

2011 LEAF owner here. Couple things: on mine, with 8/12 capacity bars remaining (4 bar loser as the kids say), fully charged I show SOC of 93.1% and 13.6 kWh remaining. And when DC charging below 50% SOC, it will stop at 90%. Above 50% it will go to 100%. Keep us updated as to the degradation, love the comparison.

Nice! A brand new charging video to watch, just as I am waiting in my Kona EV to complete its own charge...

Somebody else noticed Alyssa's lowkey reaction. She is great. She is a perfect straight guy to your high energy excitement about everything electric. You make a great team!

Wow. That’s not bad for those speeds. A 55 mph test or just around town test would be cool

Why anyone would be impressed at achieving 50 miles of range at 70 mph then having to recharge to literally go anywhere else is beyond me?? At my age I want comfort, low noise, and range. However, his enthusiasm keeps me watching. Still waiting for those new EV’s that fit my price range.

Count me in for the hypermiling around town video. ALSO, definitely can't wait for the on-board charger upgrade. And if you do decide to change out the battery, I'm game for that one too!

The early LEAFs respond very well to hypermiling. 40+PSI in good tires, climate off, accelerator control, preserving momentum, slowing before a light to let it turn green... Trying to get max range from my high mileage used 2011 LEAF (1st EV, got it as a joke) replaced my "daily hundred". Doing the hypermile version of 10/10 driving may still irritate other drivers but if fed the competitive urge and was less likely to put me in a hospital or jail. That was over 7 years ago now. LEAF is long gone, but a young relative still drives it today. Nissan replaced the battery a couple years ago, out of warranty but there was a recall. Driving a Lucid today I may have returned to my prior evil ways I'm afraid.

Thank you. Looking forward to the charger repair videos.

Great video. I have a friend that had the 2012 Leaf with the small battery, and he could get almost 60 miles of range in the summer. In the winter it was less than 40. The Leaf is heavily effected by cold weather.

Absolutely love this series

The Leaf is a well thought out car for the driver. I really love my one. I have done about 85,000km in 5 years. My one is good for a 130km round trip, I have an 80km round trip commute at the moment. On the older Leaf the charging speed and regen are good in the bottom half of the battery. The speed limit is 100km where I live, but you can drive 90 in the slow lane without holding people up, if you want to maximise range.

That is crazy, this vehicle would get me to my current job 1 way with 5 miles to spare, and it would be 10 miles short of my previous job. Glad battery technology has improved in the past decade.

I'm looking forward to all of your Leaf videos.

Thanks for another great video

Love the LEAF videos.. keep them up please. I know in my 2018 with the 40kWh pack there can be some strange behavior during top charging and a lot of times it will stop around 98% regardless of AC or DC. I have always assumed this is because it has detected that it needs to do some cell balancing and cuts out early. I think the early models might have had a charge limit setting?? Check under Zero Emission button -> Settings -> Long Life (infotainment) mode or under the charge timers (gauge cluster menu). I think you can get 80 miles in your proposed city circuit test. These cars will obviously not win any interstate efficiency awards but under 50mph it's a whole different story. Would love to see a series of videos on the AC charger repair. It's good to see you blocking up a CPE-250 for the 2nd or 3rd time that day. This is what the community expects from all of us to maintain our image.

Great video! I appreciate your, clear and concise explanation of information. I purchased a 2015 Nissan Leaf SL for 9K in September of 2021. It had 67K miles on it and 11 out of 12 bars on battery health. My Credit Union sold me an extended warranty that covers everything (including the 24KW battery) for 8 years beyond my purchase date, for $1900. Originally it was advertised as having 84 miles of range on a charge. Depending on how aggressively I drive, and if I am using the A/C or Heater, I get a City Driving range of 68 miles to 85 miles. All charging is done at home with 120VAC. I charge once every 7 to 10 days... never letting the charge drop below 25%. I plug it in at night, and the next morning it is at 100%. Previously I drove a Full Size Ford Bronco with a V8. Home Budget software shows a savings of $4800 in gasoline at the 1 year mark. Our house has a 6.27Kw Solar system on it, and even with charging the car, we generate a surplus. I will admit I wasn't keen on getting an EV at first, but after driving it for a short while, I came to LOVE it. The instant torque is addictive, low decibels in the cab makes for pleasant conversation (I'm hard of hearing) , and not having to go to the gas station and throw money into the tank constantly have all made me change my mind. It is a local commuter. If there is highway traveling to be done, we take my wife's gas car. They are not a good fit for everyone, but for those whom they make practical sense, I highly recommend!

I bought a 2013 Nissan Leaf S for $3000 with 90,000 miles and 10 out of the 12 battery health bars. Full charge does 80-85 miles range depending on your driving. Car is really more of a city or around town commuter which is exactly what I needed it for. My wife's commute to work and back is 40 miles. This car really shines at the 30-45 mph driving speed, once you hit over 50 mph it's going to eat away at your range.

Yes the 2013 and later Nissan leafs you could set the peak charge level at 80%. I'd like to see a video of of Kyle having this battery pack swapped out for a 40 KW hour pack they do do that I think it's about $6,000 to have it done aftermarket

Good call doing the leaf videos! Lots of us leaf owners in Colorado 🤠

I played with the SETEC Power inverter. Amazing how plug and play it was.

Tks for doing this. So awesome!

That was a fun video! That little Leaf is in pretty good shape battery-wise. Loved it. I bet it has not been charged to 100 percent and discharged down to zero very often, the BMS was probably totally confused. I wonder how it will be now that you have discharged it and charged it to 100 a couple of times. Also, I wonder how it would be if it were AC charged to 100 and had a chance to balance the battery a bit better.

Alyssa is like, do we have to? We have guest waiting to go to dinner! I wish I had a 2012 leaf. My commute is 6 miles daily I’d never use my gas cars, unless traveling away from home. Great video great enthusiasm. Big thumbs up. And subscribed!

Thank you so much for doing this on one of these vehicles on the Nissan leaf I thought about buying one, but didn’t know what the mileage range was or rather how they worked 50 miles is low but would work on short trips so thanks 😮

I'd swear he seems more energetic during this video than when first doing the Rivian tests. It's subtle but noticeable.

Great job on the high speed test, I really want to see what you can do in town.

Oh Thats intresting make more videos with these kinda cars ;)

Yes, let's have a look at the city range test. Well done leaf. Great video.

Last week I bought a 2013 Leaf SV with 41k miles, for $2,000. I love it.

Hi, I just had a camping family trip 102 miles away with fully loaded leaf 2022 62kwh. with 3 Young kids and a strengthened aluminium hitch basket with a 11ft3 bag. I averaged 3.1 mi/kWh on the highway at cruise set at 72-74 mph for 90 miles of the trip. Outside temp was 80 f. Without any load I do 3.5 mi/kWh on highway. And 4-4.4 mi/kWh in town. Winter performance was not too different ( In TN). Cheers.

We had 2015 leaf from 2017 to 2022. Great car, no problems. If you can live with the small range it makes a good daily driver. When we traded it for our Bolt I calculated our total cost of ownership. Purchased price -traded in value, electricity, maintainence (tires, wipers, and a 12 volt battery) the total cost was less than what we would have paid for gas for the ICE car it replaced to drive the same number of miles.

I'd definitely like to see the video of how to max the range around town.

That leaf app gives good data - love your videos! They’re super informative for an Ev shopper like myself! A phev owner on my way to electric ⚡️

9:55 balance at full batt is expected. The most information is seen when you look at those cell voltages at high speed low battery state. You can adjust the "scale" on the cell screen by tapping top or bottom side of the graph, to make it reasonable :) 0.01v difference making huge spikes is not useful info.

Haha Kyle, another Bjorn fan. Any collab planned for the winter? Would love to see two nerds nerding together. Maybe a nice camping trip in the ID Buzz? Or would Alyssa be too jealous?^^

We are in the UK and we have 2 Nissan Leaf cars, a 2011 like yours, and a 2015. They are 2 completely different cars the newer one is far better with the improved battery chemistry and improved regen. But want I wanted to say was that during the winter months we use our 2015 which has bidirectional charge to run our ASHP on cheap over night electricity all day long. (the 2011 does not have this option) To achieve this we purchased the Setec 6kw mobile power station, which sits inside the old housing of our oil burning boiler. The Setec will also come in handy if the other car runs out of duce, but for the last 5 years we've never run out or even come close. So it interesting for to see you put this to the test. We are looking to swap out the old batteries, as on the Leaf they are interchangeable. We aim to either find a 40kwh pack to replace the 2015 24kwh pack, and use the 2015 pack to swap out for the 2011. Both cars will double in range 2011 80 miles, 2015 160 miles per charge. Cost has been quoted at £12k to swap out both batteries, and dismantle the 2011 pack to sell on the cells at around £100 each and as there is 34 of them thats £3.4k back in the bank. So we get 2 cars with better range at £8.6k which is cheap than buying an newer 2019 40kwh Leaf currently advertised at £20k thats a saving of £11.4k which is cheap motoring, and house heating. I love my Leaf Nissan!

Can you guys do a video on what went wrong with home charging and how you go about fixing it?

I had read that the Leafs were speed limited, so when I found a downhill portion of interstate with a tailwind I tested how fast my 13 Leaf would go. I got to 110mph indicated before I ran out of road, it never hit any limiter. It's not very useful since it'd go about 20 miles at that speed, though.

Yeah, I wanna see the hypermile run! You’ve turned me around on buying an old Leaf, I’m scouring the ads now…👍

I like your standardized range test. I think you would have more views if they were shorter, about 10 minutes long. I love our 2022 Nissan Leaf SV plus.

I've gotta tell ya, Kyle, I'm with you all the way about this Leaf. For years, I saw them around while driving my Civic and thought, what an ugly little car. But this pas March, with gas prices rocketing, and the fact that we installed 26 PV panels along with a Tesla Powerwall, I decided to go electric. THere was a long wait for a Tesla (the prices are high anyway), and none of the dealers here had EVs in stock (I'm on an island in the middle of the Pacific. Figure it out.) So when the Nissan dealer called to say they got a 2019 Leaf in, I grabbed it. I'm so glad I did. Nissan must have put their "A" team on the design and development of this car. It's all the things you rave about and more. Quiet, smooth, comfortable, all the things you'd want in a daily driver. Mine is an SV Plus with the 62 kwh battery that's supposed to get 220 miles on a full charge. I haven't got that much, but that's mainly because I have to commute over a mountain. The 2.5 mile uphill to the top uses up 10-12 miles, depending on how big of a hurry I'm in. But absent that daily climb, I'm convinced I wouldn't have to charge more than once a week. All and all, I, too am ecstatic with this car. It's a shame that Nissan is apparently going to phase the line out over the next year or two.

Once you get the onboard charger, you’ll get to swipe left with the plug to open the orange hatch and insert in one move. Bliss.

Great Video as always, a buddy of mine had one of these and he loved it until his onboard charger died and he bought an newer leaf.

I’m very familiar with that stretch from Wellington, CO northward. I guess the biggest concern about EV’s in the West is long empty distances.

Absolutely need to do a round town range please!

Love these videos on the leaf

My wife had a 2015 Leaf and most she got was 91 miles and I had to pull her with my truck. We had it in 2016 second hand and it charged to 100% without issues and without fail at home.

Great video!

Tires: factory Ecopia are the most efficient and probably best bet. They get very noisy as they wear down. If you replace tires, get the newer version Ecopia which has a much better tread wear rating.

I have a 7 bar 2012 leaf. I drive it 36 miles daily for work and its a solid curiser for sure

Loved this video makes me want one! I even looked on Ebay and can't find a good deal sadly :(

Very interesting, but you definitely should do a below freezing cold weather range test

I loved this video. I had a 2012 Nissan Leaf for about a year but had to sell it because of the horrible range. To this day it was one of my favorite cars to drive. If only it had batter range I would still have it today. 😢

That was so much fun 👍

I love mine, mine has 17kwh 2014 model, work and back :) i doubled the motor power in mine with an e+ inverter so its lots of fun in the 5 second bracket :)

Maybe you should talk to the guy who owns Muxsan ev equipment. He has tons of experience in leafs and is basically the go to guy here. They are located in Rotterdam. I’ve visited him numerous times and he’s a really nice guy. Give me a shout out if you need help contacting him.

The wow at the end from alyssa is my partner when I start going on a hypermile adventure. LOL

Gotta watch those temps when running it down to 0% then charging at a level 3 charger! Nice test man.

Loved it fun video for the eBay special👍👍👍👍👍👌

I gave my Dad my old 2012 Nissan Leaf and he also uses it as a daily driver, dirt cheap to operate

Low beam is LED (there is an angle adjuster on the lower left dash). High beam is halogen.

I live in an area where 70 mph is not really possible. Traffic is so jammed up that the real average is more like 28 mph average (that's average speed). Sometimes less if the train holds you up.

Under the blue Energy button, you can set 80% charge limit :) Also, as Leaf’s get older the BMS gets crazy, percentages stop mattering LOL There is a percentage display if you cycle thru the menus

Love your videos!

Thank you for this test. What antenna are you using for the LeafSpy? Mine doesn't work anymore.

Very Cool test for an 'elderly?' Nissan Leaf. I am impressed. 3700 bucks. Great buy. If I were you I would be reticent about replacing the battery module just yet. But when the time comes, I hope you ensure the old one will be recycled in the most practical way. Cannot remember who that TELSA guy was who started the leading-edge recycling company, but that would be my choice for disposal. So great to see that some early EV vehicles can still make a good impression on the thrust towards a focused energy supply - electrical - whatever the original energy source. This makes the much needed refurbishment of energy delivery SO MUCH MORE SIMPLE.

I have a story that might be of interest. When my son started college 5 years ago he had a paid off used gas car that would probably need more maintenance in a short time, and he asked me what it would take to get him an EV -- the first EV in the family back then. He was commuting back and forth to college which was 19 miles away. He said he could charge it for free at school. I said if he could find one that the payments were less than what I gave him for gas money (which was much less back then). He did, he found a Fiat 500e with only 20k miles, under warranty, in absolute perfect condition. It had a short range but it was good enough at the time. It was primarily sold or leased new in CA and I think OR and we lived in a northern midwest state, but lucky enough that a specialty car dealer had picked up a truckload of Fiat 500e's at auction in CA and had them shipped to his dealership. We put snow tires on it and it did amazing. The moral of the story, it's very cost effective to have an EV with a short range for use cases such as a short work or school commute. With the loan we had, I think we paid $90/month for a few years. The auction price of the car was like $4k, and the dealer sold them for around $8k in our area and he put on new tires... but the car had a premium interior and nothing wrong with it. I heard it cost the manufacturer over $40K to build the car but they sold for less for compliance - leveling out whatever against their gas cars.

27:50 looking at cell voltage is useful when the percentages and stuff is confusing. Turtle mode comes when some amount of cells go under.. hmm, was it 3.3v? not sure. But using that display you can carefully drive by cell voltages and being gentle not to sag cells too low :D

I was watching a documentary about electric cars. The narrator said “if you’re going on a cross country trip and you have to stop in every state to recharge, you may as well go by horse and carriage”

There must be a developing market for battery upgrades for the myriad of electric vehicles as battery technology improves. The possibilities are limitless, and the Leaf is a prime example of an "easy to swap" battery design.

Looking forward to the around town test! I just bought a 2017 Nissan Leaf S! SOH = 71%

I would love to see how this does around town!

The leaf that couldn’t lol great stuff!

I had a 2013 Nissan Leaf SV and just loved it but someone ran a red light and t boned me so it was totalled. I would like to get another one and have the battery upgraded to 40kw. Very fun car to drive and loaded with nice features.

Would love to see what the cost and effectiveness of a pack upgrade/refresh on this would be. Then test it again.

Very nice, i found one of these a 2012 leaf only issue which is a bummer the regen is all but gone Any data on that issue Thanks!

I’m impressed Nissan finally did something right. My mechanic told me avoid Nissans altogether. Although some are reliable they have issues especially transmissions.

Cool video . Do the cars do better mileage in town. The term dead as a doornail, comes from the late 1800's and early 1900's when people would recycle nails pull them from old structures and re use the nails. Doornail where hammered through then bent over to keep the door together as well keep people from hurting themselves. This keeps the nail in tight ,if you ever tried to pull a bent over nail you will most likely tear off its head or bend it straight making the tip weak and hard to drive in. Hints the term Dead as a doornail. .

I bought a Saturn Astra for $3500.00 from a estate sale. It had 54k miles at the time and in near showroom condition. I have put 40k virtually trouble free miles on it , only required a alternator, and I can easily sell it for what I paid for it.

Why do you have two channels? I watch when you first purchased the leaf and looked forward on a follow up then found this video but under a different channel. Thanks for the video

50 miles at 70mph is very impressive!

If you look at your leafspy cell graphs when the battery is fairly near flat it will show you (highlight, I guess) the cells in the pack that are less well balanced.